The Tribune

By NEIL HARTNELL Tribune Business Editor ARAWAK Homes has incurred legal costs "north of $3 million" over the past 15 years in defending its title to land in Nassau's Sir Lynden Pindling Estates, its president telling Tribune Business yesterday that "up to 100 people" had met the developer to regularise their property ownership. Speaking after a recent Court of Appeal ruling further confirmed Arawak Homes' title to land that has been the subject of various legal battles over the past 27 years, Franon Wilson estimated that around 150-200 homeowners - whose title roots could be traced to Certificates found to have been obtained via fraud - had yet to meet the developer to "regularise" their ownership. The court ruling, which dismissed two appeals by contractor Dennis Dean and his wife against earlier Supreme Court verdicts, had "reaffirmed" Arawak Homes' ownership of the disputed land, and Mr Wilson reiterated his late 2010 call for all affected homeowners to negotiate with the company. He also suggested that those whose title roots could be traced back to Certificates of Title granted to the likes of John Sands and Thaddeus Johnson, both of which the Bahamian courts had found were obtained via "fraud", could possibly sue the attorneys who advised them on their purchase for negligence. Attorneys conducting title searches on behalf of their clients should have picked up the various Supreme Court and Court of Appeal decisions in favour of Arawak Homes, and the disputed title, and Mr Wilson said several had already made the necessary payments to the developer to regularise their clients' title. Describing the amount of "management time" spent on protecting Arawak Homes' title to two disputed 100-plus acre tracts as "unimaginable, phenomenal", Mr Wilson told Tribune Business: "The saga has been humungous. "I would say that Arawak Homes, in the last 15 years, would probably have incurred costs in the multi-million dollar range. It's certainly north of $3 million." He added that since Arawak Homes made its public appeal, and knowledge of the court rulings in its favour became more widespread, "dozens" of residents in the affected area had met with the developer to make their title good. "I think we're up to approaching 100 people," Mr Wilson told Tribune Business. "There's probably another 150-200 to go. There's still this many people out there." Reiterating the company's previous appeals, he added: "Arawak Homes makes it clear to all concerned that the company has every desire to help to facilitate land owners to regularise their title. "We are reaffirming our position that was stated a year-and-a-half ago. We encourage all those people to come in and have discussions with a view to doing this. It makes sense to resolve their title problems, because otherwise they will have nothing to pass on to their children. Everyone should see this as reason to do right by themselves and what's in their own self-interest." Suggesting that landowners with bad title had other remedies for their plight, Mr Wilson said: "They have the possible right of action against whatever lawyers advised them to buy this land. "We have had an increasing number of attorneys, in an effort to protect their own reputations, coming forward and paying on behalf of their clients. The ones not doing so are the ones that fall into that category of attorneys not performing up to the expected standard." Asked whether the ruling against the Deans was likely to be the last of the protracted legal battles, Mr Wilson said: "Given all the rulings that exist, the effect of all this is that whatever is left out there is likely to be procedural in nature rather than anything else, although one never knows. "The record is so compelling, and so strong, how often do people want to argue the same matter before different judges? At some point they're going to throw in the towel." When it came to the 21-lot property that was claimed by the Deans, Mr Wilson said Arawak Homes would be guided by the court rulings and orders. He added: "There is a school building on the same property, and Arawak Homes will be very conscious of minimising disruption to children who could be innocent victims. Arawak Homes will be very judicious in this." Tribune Business has detailed court rulings that found the Certificates of Title granted to John Sands and Thaddeus Johnson, via Quieting Titles Act petitions, were obtained fraudulently. Thus all homeowners in the Sir Lynden Pindling Estates area who title roots were derived from these certificates had 'bad title'. In both cases, within a week of obtaining their title certificates, Messrs Sands and Johnson had sold the subject land on to entities such as Horizon Systems, Bahamas Variety and C. S. Bahamas. These companies began selling the land on to poor, unsuspecting Bahamians, many of whom were unable to afford attorneys to conduct title searches on their behalf. Many buyers, harbouring dreams of owning 'their piece of the rock', were enticed in by the cut-price real estate on offer, and seeming 'sweet deal'. In its ruling in the Deans' case, the Court of Appeal found they relied in one case on a 1998 conveyance, and in the second, a 1999 conveyance, from Thaddeus Johnson's widow, Mergil Johnson. In both cases, their title roots lay in a Certificate of Title granted in 1982 to Thaddeus Johnson via a Quieting Titles action, the actual land grant coming in 1985. However, a 1985 Supreme Court ruling found that Thaddeus Johnson's Certificate of Title had "been procured falsely", meaning it was obtained by fraud. "We can only, therefore, conclude that the appellants' [the Deans] root of title, based as it was on the flawed and purported title flowing from Mr Johnson, was a serious and debilitating chink in their armour against [Arawak Homes] claim for trespass against them," the Court of Appeal found. Although the Supreme Court had not set aside the Thaddeus Johnson Certificate of Title when it made its 1985 ruling, Appeal Justices Blackman, John and Conteh said this was "no answer" to Arawak Homes' "claim for trespass" against the Deans. "There was no valid title flowing from that defective title which could avail Mr Johnson and his succors in title (including, in particular, the appellants in relation to the land," the Court of Appeal found. "There was simply no title in him to pass on........ "Mr Johnson's Certificate of Title, from whence the appellants derived their own title, had been found by the courts to have been procured by fraud... It was incurably bad."